Longest match you've played?

I've only been playing tennis for about a year, and i just got done with a tournament match in chapel hill. It was best 2-out-of-3 sets, but a 10-point tiebreaker instead of a full 3rd set. It took 2 and a half hours, I ended up winning 5-7, 6-4, 1-0 (19-17). I think my legs are gonna fall off now.

my longest so far was the first round of a tournament a couple weeks ago -- 2-6, 7-6 (7-2), 7-6 (7-4) in 2 hours, 45 minutes. My fitness saved the day as I made a boatload of unforced errors but managed to keep my energy level up and wear my opponent down.

What's funny is that last weekend I watched a little bit of Nadal v. Coria, went and played for a couple hours, ran some errands, and came back to see them in the 5th set. I thought 2 hrs. 45 min. was long and they doubled it.

My longest match was about 2-3 hours, first USTA sanctioned match I ever played. On synthetic grass, lost first set 4-6, won second set 6-4, lost third set 1-6. I was told my match drew the whole crowd of people there, when coming back in the second set, my opponent got some screaming from his parents and they screamed at me and my fellow tennis teammates were there to give me support, I was also told after that I should have called his many foot faults. I still regret not doing some things in this match.

well... in a match that counts my longest would be a 3-6 7-6 (13-11) 7-5 in a school varsity match that lasted about 3 hours and 15 minutes... however in a match for 'fun' my friend and i decided to go for a 5 setter that lasted like 4 hours. i lost it 7-5 4-6 4-6 4-6 -- there were many deuces and we swapped adv. in and out nearly every other game.

In college I played this guy from Greece, solid player. Match went nearly 3 hours and 30 minutes. Don't remember the scores but I lost in the third. Guys on the team gave me a bad time because they couldn't start the doubles until we both finished...and I lost in the third (remember the old 9 point tiebreaker!!). Lesson to learn, he got me into a long baseline rallies, and as the match went longer, I got stuck in the baseline groove, and I wanted to be aggressive, and chip and charge, but had so few opportunities. When I did they were not overly successful...

Last year, I played a big server and beat him in a 3 hour match, 7-6 4-6 7-6, but I was playing terrible, my return game was about zero. Recently, I had two really tough back to back (1 week apart) challenge matches against the serve and volley player below me on my high school team. This guy is a 6-4 African American guy who is about a high 5.0 that consistently hits his first serves in the 120's and has a nasty one handed backhand and serves and volleys. He's got great touch at the net, so the key is to pass him. The first match went 1-6 6-4 5-7. This was a very dissapointing loss because I was up 5-2 40-15 in the final set and also held a couple more match points and couldn't hold on. Once again I played him again, this time I jumped out to a quick 5-1 first set lead but he came back and tied it up at 5-5. I managed to hold on and take the set 7-5. The next set, he came out very strong and took it 6-0. in the third set his momentum kept going and he took a 5-2 40-0 lead. I managed to hold and fight it off until deuce and eventually win the game. I then played some of my best counterpunching tennis and took a 6-5 lead. He held serve and we proceeded to a third set tiebreaker. I eventually won 7-4 in the tiebreak, but it was a quite a match, with the final score being 7-5 0-6 7-6(7-4) over 3 and a half hours. It took especially long, because my game is playing heavy topspin several feet behind the baseline, rallying and then capitalizing on the short ball.

My high school tennis team lost in the playoffs this year. In Georgia, there are 3 singles matches and two doubles. Both of our doubles had won (that would be me!) but two of our singles had lost. So it was down to our last singles player to win the whole match for us. She played FOUR hours and it was sooooo close. I had to give her much congrats even though she lost just for holding on that long. It was a great way to end the season.

Does a USTA match allow extra breaks if it is amazingly hot during a match like the Aus Open does?

I mean, playing for 3.5 hours in the heat of the day when it's 94F -without the humidity factor, in the shade- makes for a pretty foolish match. I've seen countless guys cramp and then they take extra long in between points, and as a result the match takes even longer than it would have if they weren't forced to endure such hazardous conditions.

i would play best of 7 all the time if i could. my hitting partner and I always play for over 3 hours at the minimum. this past week we went out at 5 and got done (best of seven) at 10:30. Love it to death.

It was for the consolation finals of my third tournament. Starts at 2:00 and I have to be off the court by 4:30 to drive back to school (I was in boarding school at the time). I figure this should be no problem. Best of 3 sets with a 10 point tiebreak is split sets. I won 6-4 7-6(8-6) in a match that, I kid you not, lasted 2 hours and 55 minutes. The kid was the biggest pusher I have ever played and I got dragged into the pushing game. Points were lasting 10 shots at least on average. Plus, it was 104 F when we got on court, court temp must've been near 115.

Playing time: ~2 hr 45 min. It was my very first USTA season and we (ladies) still played out the third set. Even though it was doubles, conditions were brutal. High temps and humidity...and classic 3.0 pusher play: lotta lobs and "keep the ball in play" action.

But I swear, the 7-5, 6-4 W in singles I had earlier in that season was THE most exhausting thing I've ever done outside of childbirth.

But scorewise: 21-19 in a first set TB. The second set had a game go to 10+ deuces that we ultimate won for a break to win 7-6, 6-3. To this day, it's one of my more meaningful matches: my long-time mentor was team captain and watching "us"...and it meant a well-deserved team victory.

I've only been playing tennis for about a year, and i just got done with a tournament match in chapel hill. It was best 2-out-of-3 sets, but a 10-point tiebreaker instead of a full 3rd set. It took 2 and a half hours, I ended up winning 5-7, 6-4, 1-0 (19-17). I think my legs are gonna fall off now.

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I played a 3 Hour match in the middle of the day. It was in Macon GA, in the middle of July on hard courts. I ended up losing in a third set. I then got a 60 minute break, and had to go back on the court for the consolation match, which I won in a measly 2 Hours and 30 minutes.
(Really like the avatar btw)

There were quite a few deuce points played and this was in Texas in July with on court temps over 100 degrees.

I ended up cramping so badly towards the end of the third set my opponent gave me 5 minutes to recover (as best I could) before the tiebreak as he did not want to win the match in a default.

I completed the match but I would like to think that cramping out is what caused me to loose that match. I ended up have several more matches with the same guy that year and all of them were brutal 3 set matches. We ended up becoming somewhat tennis "friends" after playing each other in tournaments so much. For a while we thought the draws were rigged!

About 3 hours 20 mins, USTA match a couple years ago. I won 7-6 5-7 10-7 (match tb). I was playing a friend that I knew was very closely matched with me. We started playing at 9:00, and every game was close with many deuces and several multiple deuces. At 5-5, I left the court to go out and chase a ball that we hit over the fence. A couple matches were done and one guy asked if we split sets. I pulled out that set with a 10-8 tb. It was after 10:30 already at this point.

The second set was a little quicker, but not much (and just as close). I got a match point with him serving at 4-5 30-40 and netted an easy passing shot. This turned the momentum back towards him. We split around 11:55.

We contemplated a match tb, but decided to play out the thrid. As we started, the local high school tournament started coming on the courts around us. At 2-2 in the third, at about 12:10, the tournament director came out and told us we had to get off the courts for the tournament and that we were over an hour past our time. We told him this was an untimed USTA match and that we were in the thrid set. He let us go back to playing, but at this point, we decided it was probably best to abondon the 3rd and play a match tb instead to let the tournament use the courts (this was the HS state tournament, so it was important). There were 2 or 3 guys from our teams still hanging around watching at the end. They said that was the best match they'd seen all season.

I played the same guy again the next time we played that team and won again 6-7 7-6 10-6, although we kept that one around 2:15-2:30 on the clock. I guess you could say we're fairly evenly matched. LOL.

My longest match ever was in my junior tournament days. Started at 10AM and ended around 6PM because of two rain delays. It started raining a few games into the first set, so they pulled all matches and told us to wait it out, then they dried the courts, and put us back on with a 10 min warmup. We got a few more games in before it started raining again, and this time it didn't look like it was going to let up so they had to move all the outdoor matches from a few different sites over to a nearby indoor club. At least the second time we knew we wouldn't go on for a while and they said come back at 3. Of course putting that many matches on with that many fewer courts they fell behind schedule and we didn't go back until about 4:30. I ended up losing, but if I had kept winning I would have had to play my next round at night, then the semi's were pushed to Sunday morning and the finals would be played later that afternoon. That would have been tough.

As far as actual playing time, I can't think of any remarkably long matches, and got used to playing pretty quick matches. I remember in college our matches didn't last very long because most of the time you just took turns holding serve with quick points until someone got a few key returns in to snag a break.